BBC Radio 4 2016-02-18

BBC Radio 4 2016-02-18

Good morning. The presidential address of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the General Synod was published yesterday. It focuses on last month’s meeting of the primates from around the Anglican communion and brings home what a roller coaster of emotions that meeting must have been, particular for the archbishop, hosting the meeting in his cathedral in Canterbury.

As is well known, for some years the communion has been divided in its approach to human sexuality, particularly same sex relationships. The divisions are deep and dangerous because they’re perceived to be ones of principal, on the one hand the loyalty to biblical teaching, generally negative to homosexuality, on the other a deep commitment to individual human rights now mostly taken for granted in Western societies. Things came to a head last June when the General Convention of The Episcopal Church in America altered their definition of marriage so as to be gender neutral, gay marriage was approved. The reaction to this, particularly from African church leaders was hostile, and given this, the archbishop must have been mightily relieved that all the primates showed up for his meeting in Canterbury, and all but one stayed together until the end of the week. But there were stressful moments. In his address to synod the archbishop said this.

“One of the moments in which we voted was on the question, when all seemed lost, as to whether we would walk together or separately. And it did seem lost. But the vote to walk together was unanimous. It was done by open voting of raised hands, and was total. However, the divisions were profound, and remain so.” So why is unity so important for the Communion if the divisions are so deep?

Well the Archbishop goes on to speak of the balance between order and diversity saying “When the balance is wrong, and even more so when we feel threatened, like a ship with a dysfunctional crew heading for the rocks, different groups all strive to grab the wheel so that, as they see it, they may demonstrate that they and only they know the way to avoid disaster. The reality is that none of them do know fully, and disaster is only avoided by unity which relishes and celebrates the diversity of freedom within broad limits of order.” He goes on, ”For the first time, I experienced the beauty of the Communion when, on issues affecting us very widely there was a sharing and an outpouring of mutual support. ”

There you have it, the tension between order and diversity for the good of all, and it’s been an issue for the church from the very start when the apostles Paul, Peter and James disagreed profoundly upon how much of traditional Judaism gentiles had to adopt on becoming Christians. And, in fact, I think that that balance between order and diversity lies at the heart of any healthy society.